I lied to you. It wasn't a big lie, I promise, but it was a lie nonetheless. I know I said I wouldn't, but I did. My name isn't Quinn Fabray. Or rather, it is, but it is not the name I was given at birth. The name bestowed upon me by my parents when I had entered the world was Lucy. Thus, my name in fact, is Lucy Fabray. Quinn is my middle name, but I infinitely prefer it to Lucy.
In the summer between middle school and high school, my family moved across town. I was hoping that high school would be infinitely better than my middle school experience. You see, the blonde, athletic, pretty girl I am now did not then exist. Lucy Fabray was chubby, wore glasses with lenses too big to serve any real purpose, had brown hair and was bullied to no end. She had no friends and was miserable. Those were the lowest days of my life. I was diagnosed with clinical depression and despite the many hours spent in a therapist's office, the depression only slightly eased.
Have you ever been so unhappy with yourself that you would do anything to achieve the happiness you knew you deserved? I have.
"Lucy Caboosey," is what they used to call me, along with other things, like "Four Eyes," "Fatso," and "Chubby Cheeks." I hated the way I looked. Wouldn't you, if you were being made fun of all the time? I was insecure, I cried all the time, and going to school was like living through a nightmare everyday. Nightmares are supposed to end when you opened your eyes, but this one only began when I opened them. So I did what I had to do in that summer break between middle school and high school to ensure that I wouldn't be bullied any longer. I was going to a different school from the one everyone from middle school was going to, on account of us moving across town, and I knew that was my one big chance to change who I was and begin living the life I'd always wanted to.
First, I dyed my hair. Gone were the scruffy brown locks which I'd been with all my life and sitting in their place, newly bleached, were blonde strands. The girls who made fun of me were blonde, and having wanted nothing more than to fit in with them over the course of my middle school years, I thought the best chance I had at being popular at my new school was to look something like them. Of course this meant that I regularly had to redye my hair, but that was a small price to pay.
Next, I snapped my massively framed glasses in half and threw them in the trash. "Four Eyes" was gone, replaced with a girl who seemingly had perfect eyesight. In truth, a visit to the optometrist later with a request, I went home with contact lenses. I was unsure of putting them on at first; shoving things into your eyes was a foreign concept to me and completely unnatural, but remember when I talked about adaptation before? Well, this was merely another thing I became adapted to doing. I still wear them, and barely anybody knew until this past year, when one Lauren Zizes, in an attempt to sabotage my Prom Queen campaign, dug up my entire past, including Lucy Caboosey, and then went on to reveal it to the entire student body.
That was one of the worst moments of my life, but do you know, dear reader, I was also relieved. It meant I no longer had anything to hide; the crippling secret I'd been carrying around with me throughout high school was gone - it was out, I didn't have to be afraid of someone finding out, because they already had. Suddenly, I could breathe again; the weight which had been pressing itself against my ribcage and lungs was gone and I could breathe. I felt like a woman who'd just taken off a tight corset and felt her lungs expand to their full for the first time. Dear reader, it was a glorious feeling. The best part was that people's reactions weren't as terrible as I thought they were going to be. They laughed for a little bit, but soon were on to the next topic of conversation. It almost makes me think that I should have revealed it earlier. But nevermind that. "What's done is done," as Lady Macbeth so famously said.
Over that summer, I discovered athleticism. This was something I had despised during middle school because of the way I was always excluded due to my being unpopular. But during that break, I found that I quite enjoyed the exercise when there was no one there to ridicule me. I began sports; dancing, gymnastics, then eventually, cheerleading. The weight I'd been carrying began disappearing, as though it was melting away. Not only was I physically lighter, but I was emotionally lighter too. I felt happy with myself, I was happy with how I felt, I was almost happy with the way I looked.
I say almost happy with the way I looked because there was just one more thing: my nose. I'd never been happy with it. I'd never been teased about it, but I'm sure that had I been thinner then they would have. So, when my father got a pay rise, I asked to make the final change to my appearance, one that was almost entirely a vanity adjustment. When he said yes, I was off to the nearest plastic surgeon. Yes, when I was almost 15, I got a nose job.
"You're too young!" you may be thinking, and I suppose you're probably right, but when you're desperate to never be in a situation where you're constantly harassed because of how you look, you'd do anything in your power to make sure it never happens again. That, for me, meant having that cosmetic surgery. I'll most likely never do it again, but I did what I had to do at the time. After the surgery I felt more confident, like I could look at the impending start of high school and not feel dread, the way I had just weeks before. And to be honest, dear reader, my plan worked. I began high school, I attracted people who were like me, who dreamt the same dreams as I, who had the same interests. I joined the Cheerios, the school's cheer squad, and after that first year, was chosen by both the outgoing captain and Coach Sylvester to be the next head Cheerio. I was on top of the school.
All this I did, by the way, under the name of Quinn Fabray. Lucy was someone else, that fat girl who was mercilessly teased, and I didn't want the memory of that lingering into the new life I was trying to build, so I asked my parents to start calling me Quinn. This wasn't too difficult, as I'd always preferred that name in the past and they had called me that before, rather than Lucy. It was just that now they would refer to me as Quinn exclusively, rather than Quinn in private and Lucy to other people. It was very much a case of out with the old and in with the new.
I was happy, so, so happy, dear reader at my transformation. I was head Cheerio, I was dating the captain of McKinley's football team, Finn Hudson, and everyone wanted to be me. I was cruel, this is true, to those who were strange, unusual or had dreams different than those that everyone else had, such as Rachel Berry, but this was only to be expected. If I had not acted the way I did towards her, I would not have been as respected. No body, my friend, respects someone at the top if they are not cruel towards those at the bottom. If I had been as kind as I had wanted to be, I would have fallen, and all that I had changed about myself would have been in vain. I regret it now, as I am at the bottom again, but at the time, I did what was expected of me.
I'm writing this to you, and I know you'll read it and wonder why. In all honesty, I did not start with a particular intent. But as I have written, I have discovered a purpose.
"Don't you ever show any emotion?" Finn once asked me when he was breaking up with me. Admittedly it was after a funeral, so I should have been more emotional than I was; I believe he felt cheated that I only shed a single tear.
"I never know where I stand with you," he told me another time.
It's true, reader, what he said. To the outside world I am hard and cold, tying you close, but keeping you far, so you never truly know where you and I stand in relation to one another. The fact of the matter is that I've always been afraid of showing just how much people mean to me; should they understand, then they could hurt me - it would become a vulnerability. If there's one thing that Quinn Fabray hates, it's being vulnerable.
Distance thus meant that you thought you meant something important to me, but you were never quite certain. You stuck by because you wanted to know if you meant as much to me as I meant to you. The truth? My friends always meant the world to me, even if they didn't know it. Believe me when I say, reader, that I care deeply, it is just that I am incapable of ostentatious displays of affection; they embarrass me and say too much about how I am feeling.
And it's too hard to say goodbye if the other person knows how much you care.
Goodbyes are a part of life as inevitable as tomorrows. As inevitable as hellos, as it stands. But goodbyes are always much more difficult to bear. When I was seven, I said goodbye to Nana Fabray. Several years later, Papa Fabray followed suit - he never was the same after his wife died. Two years ago, I farewelled my sister to college; not a permanent goodbye, but a difficult one nonetheless. And finally, last year, the most difficult goodbye in a long, long list of goodbyes, most of which aren't mentioned, I had to see my father turn his back on our family because my mother realised that his way of life was staunching the growth of love within our household.
I will never forgive him for that act of cowardice. Instead of staying to fight, he threw up his arms and walked away. Don't misunderstand me, reader, I loved my daddy, but when he ordered me out of his house when I revealed my pregnancy, he lost my respect and much of my love; daddy stopped being 'daddy' and instead became 'father'.
Oh, yes, I was a pregnant teenager. Sorry I haven't mentioned it before now. I was 16 years old and carrying my first child. The story is a long one, and I'll doubtless have time to tell it to you later, but I must first get to my point. Forgive me for being longwinded; I did warn you that I rambled, when you and I first embarked on this journey together, did I not?
My point is, I do not let anybody in, past the defences I have spent years building simply because saying goodbye is too difficult and because I've learnt from experience that the ones you care about the most are the ones who will hurt you beyond repair. Thus, to the point I originally began explaining to you before getting sidetracked once again, is that the purpose of this journal, resting in your hands as you sit beside your little lamp, giving off its yellow light glow in the middle of the night, is for me to record all those things I could never say, never show. This little book here, filled with my almost illegible scrawl, contains all the emotions and all the truths I've been too afraid to admit to, the ones I've tried desperately to keep from the world. It's allowed me a chance at honesty I've never before given myself for fear of being ridiculed, looked down upon, or yet again, hurt. That's why I've continued telling my story, dredging up my history, and timidly putting forth my dreams. You haven't judged, have you, dear reader? You won't look down on me, will you stranger? You won't use this information to your advantage, will you?
Or should I be afraid of you? Should I be padlocking every entrance into my house? Should I just stop my writing here and burn the book while I have the chance, before anyone alive is allowed to read it?
No, I won't do that. I'd be burning away a part of my soul. Every time I open this journal, I leave behind another part of myself; I cannot simply see that go up in ashes.
The hardest part is not knowing who you are. Have we met before? Are you someone I may have passed in the street? Would I know your face if I saw it? Lima is not a big place, could I have run into you before? It's entirely possible, is it not?
The other difficult thing about writing all this for you to read, stranger, is that I've not the slightest clue about how you are reacting to everything that you're learning about me. Does my life shock you? Do you think I have been through too many terrible things for a 17 year old? Do you think much more of it is my fault than I admit to? Do you think I should have handled things differently? Do you agree with my choices? What about my attitudes? What are your opinions on those? Do you feel sympathy for me? Do you pity me? Do I disgust you?
But the most important question, in my mind, that I would like to put to you, dear reader is this: do you understand?
If your answer to that question was "Yes," then any other opinion you may have of me will be absorbed by the armour I have spent my life perfecting to protect me. Too long I have been without someone to understand and the most miserable people in existence are those who are misunderstood. Being misunderstood lead to many a dark thing.
Can I share something with you, reader? Do you know of that underworld of depressed teenagers? The ones who hurt so much they haven't the slightest clue what do to about it? They are so mockingly called "emo" now by society, as though their emotions can be laughed at, as though their depression isn't a serious issue. Others try to emulate their looks, their attitudes and society, for a short while, deemed it acceptable and even 'cool'. Let me tell you, dear friend, it is the furthest thing from cool. Depression is a mental illness which mostly goes untreated because of the stigma attached to it. The vast majority of people wrongly believe that depression is a personal sign of weakness and that admitting to it is an outward display of that weakness.
I suffered from it. 9.5% of Americans will suffer from it each year. 15% of them will commit suicide. I was nearly one of them. This past year was not as good as I pretended that it was. The confident girl often hides her depression behind smiles; the girl who stands next to you in the queue staring quietly into the distance could be holding back the tears which threaten to overwhelm her at any given moment. Or, even, you know that boy, the popular one, the quarterback, he too secretly struggles to hide his pain. He cannot admit that the cuts which cover his arms are by his own doing. And the cheerleader hides her own cuts with the length of her shirt.
That is how I hid my cuts, at least. Hips are a remarkably discreet place to run a blade across your skin. No one can see the angry red lines which crisscross your skin there. If no one can see them, then no one is able to question you. I cut almost everyday. Most days not because anything was wrong, but because I was compelled to do so, the way an alcoholic is compelled to walk into every liquor store they pass, or, even, the way I was compelled to begin writing this journal. The feeling of the blade against soft flesh was so wrong, but so good. I cannot describe it to you, dear reader. I knew it wasn't right to hurt myself, but it was the only way I felt better; it was as though if I released enough blood through the cuts, I could ease some of the feelings which ran through my veins. It was a way of making the emotional pain I felt manifest in a physical form; physical pain is always easier to bear than emotional. I was a very bad state of my life; worse even than when I'd been called Lucy Caboosey.
"Are you ok?"
"I'm fine," that was the question and the response that was frequently conveyed between myself and various people. No one need know the truth about me, I used to think.
Pretending that everything is ok is so easy and the lies flowed so freely that it is terrifying. I've amazed myself countless times because of the ease I have with lying. A smile hides so many things and a short temper is the best defence, I have found, because people are too wary to try prying.
In New York, I seriously considered taking my own life. I was sitting in the bathroom of the room we all shared, staring at myself in the mirror, the way I used to look at myself when I was 14 and still Lucy Fabray. I made lists in my head: why I should live, why I shouldn't, who would miss me, who wouldn't, what was wrong with me, what was wrong with the world. Words, phrases, images, memories all spun through my mind, each breaking down the self worth I had spent three years building and I sat there with a bathtub full of water and curling iron in hand, ready to plunge the electrical device into the freezing cold water. I was talking myself into doing it, I was crying, I could barely see my reflection through the tears.
"Quinn! Quinn! Hurry up and quit hogging the bathroom!" those were the words which saved my life. I'll never be more grateful for the existence of my fellow Glee clubbers, notably Santana Lopez and Brittany Pierce, who I could break down in front of and not have them condemn me as a crazy woman. Santana suggested a haircut as a remedy to my state of mind, and I must say, it did help. The short locks which now grace my head reignited a spark of confidence within myself and I could stand with my head high again.
Consider, reader, had Santana not knocked on the bathroom door, angrily demanding my exit, I could be lying in a coffin at this very moment. She saved my life, and she had no idea that she did it. Are you as thankful as I am for that moment? I cannot ever express the depth of my gratitude to her; I'm indebted to her beyond her knowledge. It is also because of her that I face the world with newfound confidence and grace; and of course, a new hairstyle.
Author's Note: I didn't make up the stats about depression in America. They come from this website:
.com/depression_